Friday, October 15, 2010

The American Primary Sources Challenge

The goal of this challenge is to get us all a little more educated in American history by reading primary sources.

American history has always been one of my worst subjects. I hardly studied it in school, and didn't read much after that. I always mean to read the Federalist papers or Lincoln's speeches, it just never happens. But if I have a challenge to live up to, I think I'll get much closer to learning something about my country--so here we are.

Jean defines a primary source as:

Texts produced in the time we are studying. (If you are studying Eleanor Roosevelt, a letter from her is a primary source; a biography of her life is a secondary source.) You may read diaries, news accounts, letters, oral narratives, poems, sermons, essays, speeches, folksongs, almost anything. And you may study anyone or any time period in American history.

The Guidelines:

Participants may join in at any time. Comment on the dedicated blog introductory post to join.

Each participant will read a primary source document weekly (if it's really long, feel free to work in weekly chapters or segments). The weeks will start on Sundays.

If you're not American but want to participate, read your country's historical documents!

Jean is posting a weekly post telling what she's read. You can leave a comment telling about what you read. Discussions are encouraged.

There are links on the dedicated blog to massive collections of every sort of American historical texts you could desire.